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by Charm2999



Category: Boy Meets World, Girl Meets World
Genre: Angst, F/M, Family, M/M, Multi, OT3, Suicidal Thoughts, Suicide Attempt
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-12-09
Updated: 2018-12-09
Packaged: 2019-09-14 19:57:53
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,784
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16919400
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Charm2999/pseuds/Charm2999
Summary: He remembers being alone in a motel in Minnesota, and then he's in a hospital living in the aftermath of his decisions rather than listening to every instinct he has and making a run for it the first chance he gets.*** Shawn attempts to commit suicide and is forced to finally confront his own demons.





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**Author's Note:**

> This does get a bit dark so my apologies. This is set after the Christmas episode of GMW but it's taken far out of canon.

 

It was too cold in the room. That was the first thought that passed through his mind as consciousness returned to him. The discomfort was almost instantaneous, and it stirred him and pulled him out of his sleep like a fishing line in waters on a warm Sunday morning. The world had seemed so still for a moment and he had finally felt calm. It was an incredible feeling, one that he had not experienced in years. A man on the run never had a moments rest, his whole life he had spent anticipating the next hit, protecting himself from the next catastrophe, planning the next stage of his awe-inspiring mad dash across the world. He lived the life that many people he assumed had always wanted. No worries, no stress, nothing to hold him back and no real responsibilities to follow up with. Where ever he went that’s what strangers often told him but at that moment he wondered if they were right. After all what was so great about waking up cold and alone in the mountains of Minnesota at an old motel that was brighter than the sun itself.

 

His eyes strained to keep closed as he moved to turn away from the light, but he felt constricted like there was something attached to his arms, just as he was about to pull on them he heard something slam shut forcing him to try and raise his heavy eyelids. He could see the blurry image of a woman standing over him, she looked so familiar, but his eyes couldn’t focus of her no matter how hard his brain tried.

 

“Shawn?”

 

His eyes widened as her voice pierced through him like an arrow coated in poison. It was one of few he would recognize anywhere in the world.

 

“Topanga?” He whispered, believing that his mind was simply playing tricks on him in the early hours of the morning as his brain tried to catch up with the rest of the world. He knew he was in Minnesota, he remembered it clearly enough. The past year had ended with Christmas in New York with the Mathews family, with the only people he truly loved and the family they had created. Leaving them had torn a hole through his heart and soul that he had tried to fill with city after city, state after state, he had put so many miles on his car that he had already blown out a tire. As he looked up at her knew he had left her in the arms of the man he loved more than anything in the world it had been less than two months ago, he knew that to be true. He was dreaming. He dreamt of her often, and _him_ too so that wasn't surprising.

 

“Yeah, it’s me. Thank goodness. I…I, oh Shawn” He could see her a bit more clearly now as he squinted his eyes. He knew those were tears. God how he hated seeing her cry. She was the strong one out of the three of them damn it.

 

He didn’t know when he had reached his hand out to her, but it felt less like an arm and more like a fifty-pound dumbbell. She fell onto the bed next to him as she pulled his hands to her lips. He could feel them tremble as he reached his hands further to wipe at the tears. It was then that he noticed the IV’s on his arm and the drip it was connected to.

 

“I… I’m in the hospital?” His voice croaked out the words as though they felt foreign on his tongue. His throat felt as dry as the Sahara and the pain was almost excruciating. What the hell had happen to him.

 

The anger in Topanga’s eyes was as fast as a spark to a match, almost instantaneous as she pulled back from him. Whatever he had done was bad and he could practically feel his entire body tense for impact. The impact didn’t come. Instead he opened the eyes he hadn’t realized he had closed and met her eyes once again.

 

“Yes Shawn. We are. You’ve been here for three days.”

 

The words felt like being hit full force with a train. Three days was an impossible amount of time. He didn’t remember anything. Had he been in an accident, had he driven off a cliff.

 

“You don’t remember what happen?” She asked cautiously. Her voice as measured as it probably was in court before a judge as she tried to keep her temper in check.

 

He shook his head softly and he wracked his brain for an answer.

 

“I was in Minnesota.” He stated

 

“We still are.” She agreed, her hands were still folded around his as she lowered it to her lap. He knew she probably wanted nothing more than the cross her arms and glare down at him, but he couldn’t understand why.

 

“I… I swear I was in my motel. I went out with the guys in town and then I was in the motel and I was gonna sleep and-.“ All of a sudden the memories of that night came rushing to mind. The guys from town who were telling him about the haunted tourism in the town that his article was about. The bar that they were in. The glass they had handed to him. The feel of alcohol down his throat for the first time in decades. He swore to himself as he remembered the relapse. He didn’t realize that was what they had given him but then he couldn’t stop. But he couldn’t have drank that much. And he hadn’t done anything dangerous. He had gone back to the motel he knew that he had-.

 

Instantly he remembered the nightmare his anxiety and the alcohol had created together. The need to sleep but his mind refusing to allow him to do so. The sleeping pills in his bag. The need to take one. And then maybe another for good measure. The realization that he was tired of going to sleep at night and waking up at all. The haunting feeling of emptiness and loneliness that had taken over his life over the past few years. The nagging voice that perpetually sat in the back of his mind telling him it wasn’t worth it anymore. That the effort he put into living wasn’t worth it anymore. He could remember so clearly looking at that bottle of sleeping pills and wondering if it was time to end this game of cat and mouse he had been playing with himself for so damn long. There was a reason he kept those pills there after all. They had always been the backup plan he kept in his back pocket. He knew he had tried to drown the bottle.

 

“Sleep huh? Is that what you want to call it.” Topanga was holding his hand in a vice grip as she said it and every cell in his body wanted to scream all at once.

 

“Topanga…”

 

“They went to kick you out of the motel room Shawn. That was why they went in. You hadn’t paid them yet and they…They found you half dead on the floor with a bottle of sleeping pills for fucks sake. It’s a miracle that they got you here. You… You were in a coma for three days Shawn” She cried as she finished the last sentence. The sound a sledgehammer to his soul. She pulled the back of his hand back to her lips as she continued to cry into it. He could feel the tears prick the corners of his own eyes. He… He didn’t think she would find out. This wasn’t how he had ever planned for it to go damn it.

 

“I… I’m sorry.” His own voice croaked as he tried to subdue the sob. He knew he had always been a fuck up but this. He didn’t think this would happen. He didn’t think this was how this decision would end. “I… I’m so sorry Topanga. I didn’t think. I j- I just thought.”

 

“Thought what Shawn! Though that this would go well? Thought that you wouldn’t have to face me after this?” She asked as she stood, pulling away from him as quickly as she could. It took less than a moment for her to wrap her arms around herself like a blanket and a shield. She was practically shaking as she turned away from him to wipe away the tears.

 

“I…I don’t know what I thought I. I was just so tired...”

 

“Too tired to live?!” She demanded as she glared back at him.

 

“Yeah. Yeah I guess I was.” He sounded so broken saying that. Even to himself he sounds so damn broken. He knew he was messed up. He always had. But this somehow made it all so much fucking worse. The tears trailing down her face, her shoulders shaking like an earthquake was rampaging its way through her body. He knew he was as broken as they come. He had always been a broken man, but he knew this was breaking her too. He had spent the last 12 years running away from her, from Cory, from their family because he knew he had a tendency to ruin everything and everyone he loves, and now he had somehow managed to fucking do it again.

 

“Shawn I swear-“ He didn’t know what she was about to say when the door opened and a doctor walked into the argument he was sure they were about to have, but he was thankful for the interruption none the less.

 

“Mr. Hunter correct? I’m Dr. Morgan and I’m glad to see you’re finally awake, you gave us quite the scare. I hope I didn’t interrupt anything.” The old man’s eyes crinkled in a way that made Shawn wonder if he had known exactly what he had been doing when he abruptly opened that door. Topanga instantly turned away from the doctor and Shawn as he approached the bed. She was wiping away the tears as discreetly as she could while the doctor asked him some questions and did a few tests. The older gentleman handed a glass of water when he complained about the pain in his throat and some medication to take while he was at it.

 

“Well to be frank with you Mr. Hunter I have to say that you are a very lucky man. If you had gotten here much later then when you had there’s a chance that coma you had slipped into might have lasted a lot longer if not indefinitely. You dodged death by the skin of your teeth, now I have some paperwork I’d like you to fill up, our psychologist will be coming in a little later to do some tests of her own but until then this will give us a measure of where you are at.

 

“Listen. I don’t need to see a psych-“

 

“Oh, for the love of god Shawn do not start!” Topanga exclaimed, jumping out of the seat she had taken by the door.

 

“I think I know what’s going on in my head I don’t need any help. I was just not thinking straight. It isn’t going to happen again.”

 

“Shawn-“

 

“Mr. Hunter. This was an attempted suicide, not a fender bender. We cannot let you go until you have a psych-evaluation. It’s not that I don’t believe you but you need to understand that-“

 

“You tried to kill yourself, Shawn. You nearly died, why can’t you seem to grasp that!” Topanga shouted over the doctor as she approached the bed

 

“It’s not a big deal!” Shawn shouted back as he raised himself up to meet Topanga’s glare.

 

“YES, IT IS.” She shot back ready to fight him on this tooth and nail until he conceded.

 

“ALRIGHT!” The doctor shouted as he pushed his way in between them and separated the two of them himself. “This is a hospital if you do not lower your voices I will get security in here.” He added as he fixed them both with a pointed look forcing both of them to back off. Topanga turned around and walked back towards her computer, pulling it open to start typing is what seemed to be an attempt at taking her anger out on her keyboard rather than on Shawn.

 

“Regardless of whether you agree or not I cannot let you leave this hospital without one.” He continued. “So, if you don’t mind, I would like you to go through these questions and fill them out. It is a checklist, so I don’t think it should take you long.” He stated as he handed him the clipboard.

 

Shawn stared at it skeptically for a moment before going through the pages, filling it out to the best of his ability. The moment he was done the doctor had nurses in his room escorting him to different rooms and to do different tests. Topanga had barely looked up from the computer screen as they had rolled him out of the room in the wheelchair even after he insisted that he could walk. Hours passed in a blur of appointments with different doctors, specialists, psychologists and therapists all of them trying to understand him and pick at his brain. Topanga wasn’t in the hospital room when he got back, and he didn’t know whether to be relieved or upset by that. His nurse forced him to eat his dinner under her watchful eye before leaving him alone with the sinful thoughts that had gotten him there in the first place. Every bone in his body screamed at him to make a run for it while he had the chance. He was finally alone, he knew he could be out of state within the hour if he wanted to be. It wouldn’t be the first time he made a quick escape under the curtain of night, trying to run from a feeling or a memory or an inclination that he knew would ruin what little he had going for him.

 

He didn’t know when, during his grand plan of escape, that he fell asleep, but when he woke up she was back. Her hand was holding his and she was bent over his bed and asleep on his chest, her hair splayed around her face like a halo. It was well into the night, or at least that’s what the clock on the wall in front of him said and he hoped that this hadn’t been how she had spent the last few nights. Thinking back on it he still didn’t know when she had arrived or even how, who had they called when they found him and what on earth made _her_ come here. His mind was racing with questions, but his body was still too exhausted to humor them. He fell asleep looking at her face and wondering how, even this far away from civilization, he had still managed to involve them in this mess, and how thankful he somehow still was that she was here.

 

 

He awoke late that next day to Topanga once again clanking away at her keyboard like it was a punching bag for her feelings. Chances were that that’s exactly what she was using it for. She had a tendency to bury herself in work as a way to distract herself from the goings on of the world around her and the chaos she sometimes found herself in. He always thought she worked too hard but then again, he couldn’t be one to talk. At least she stuck around to deal with her problems and didn’t just leave the country every time the going got tough. Of them, Cory was the only one who could deal with their problems head-on. He was usually the brave one out of them.

 

“What are you thinking about?” She asked, her typing not slowing down once.

 

“You.” He stated. Her eyes rose to meet his instantly where they matched off for far longer than what felt comfortable by any stretch of the imagination. Eventually, she sighed and closed the laptop screen, putting it back into its bag.

 

“Are you really trying to start another fight Hunter?” She asked as she stood up and made her way over to him. She was in different clothes than the one's last night, so he hoped she hadn’t stayed at the hospital the entire time.

 

“What are you doing here Topanga?”

 

Her eyebrow quirked at the question like it should have been obvious to him, he half expected her to tell him so but instead, she sat down on the bed so that they were too close for comfort.

 

“Listen I just-“ He started to expand but she stopped him mid-thought with a hand on his cheek, her thumb sliding across his cheek as gently as he thought possible. She leaned in to kiss him as naturally as taking a breath on a warm summer night. It was instinct. An instinct he had spent decades running away from.

 

“I’m here because I love you, you idiot.” She whispered as she pulled back. As his eyes opened to meet hers there was a clarity in them that he remembered so clearly from their childhood. “I’m here because _we_ love you.” She continued, her hand intertwining with his and pulling them both up to their faces. She put her wedding ring up to his lips as she rested her forehead against his.

 

“Cor.” He whispered, her eyes started to water as she nodded.

 

“He’s been calling constantly. He almost booked a flight when I told him you were conscious you know.” She explained.

 

“The kids.” He stated, filling in the blanks like it was obvious to both of them.

 

“No. No Shawn, this would have broken him” She whispered back, her eyes closing as she leaned her head against hers. The tears finally rolling down her face like an avalanche picking up speed as they go. He had been in an avalanche once and had to be rescued a couple of hours later, it had been a special kind of hell, but this was somehow so much worse. He had lived through hell, time and time again, but _they_ didn’t deserve that.

 

“He loves you almost more then he loves me.” She sobbed as he wrapped his other arm around her and pulled her closer.

 

“That’s not true.” He whispered back.

 

“You know that it is. He… When he got the call, he was so scared. I was so scared but… but they said you were stable. I came because I thought I could take it, but I know he can’t Shawn.” She wrapped her arms around his neck as she pulled herself into his lap, crying into his shoulder as the weight and pressure had finally come off of her shoulders.

 

“I’m sorry Topanga… I’m so so so sorry. You have to know that. I didn’t want you to have to-“

 

“To what Shawn. Because you put yourself here. At least you were a-… At least you were alive. If…” She was the strongest person Shawn had ever known but as her shoulders began to shake and she sobbed harder and harder into his shoulder Shawn knew he would never forgive himself for this.

 

He wasn’t sure when he had begun to cry but there were tears on his face as pulled her close, his head was tucked into her shoulder and neck as he began to cry. The apologies spilled from his lips like a mantra that would not end. The words I’m sorry drowning out any other thought he had. Every bone in his body still screamed for him to run but for some reason, he couldn’t let her go.

 

“What were you thinking Shawn. For fucks sake what the hell were you thinking. You run from one place to the next, tearing our hearts out with you every time you go. We’ve never stopped you or held you back.” He cried even harder as she said that because, god if the guilt wasn’t bad before, now it was excruciating.

 

“We thought that this was what made you happy Shawn. That this was why you didn’t want us-“

 

“No-” He cut her off before the thought so much as registered in her mind. “I love you. You know I love you but I can’t-“

 

“Can’t what Shawn…Can’t what” She asked, she asked as she continued to cry into his shoulder, her body still quaking from the force of her sobs.

 

“I destroy everything Topanga.”

 

“God damn it Shawn!” She shouted, pulling her self up far enough to look him in the eyes.

 

“No. Listen. I know you don’t want to believe me but-.” Her hand covered his lips before he could continue to fight her.

 

“No Shawn you listen. I’ve listened to you, I’ve listened to Cory, I’ve let you run from Philadelphia to Kansas to Singapore to Egypt to Uganda and I’m sick of it. No more excuses Shawn no more fucking running.” She said as she wiped away her tears with the back of the hand she wasn’t holding his mouth closed with.

 

“Now tell me why you did it. I saw the prescription from the pills. They were from over two years ago and there were more bottles in your luggage for the love of god. Why were you carrying them around Shawn?” Her voice didn’t crack once as she asked him the last question. Her eyes didn’t leave him as she waited for an answer. She moved her hand to his cheek as she waited. The moments went by so slowly it felt like time was almost frozen. He couldn’t escape from this. Even he knew that.

 

“They were a back up plan. I… I thought it was a good idea. If it ever got to be too much I…”

 

“Oh Shawn” She whispered as she rested her head against his again, the tears once again falling from her eyes.

 

“I’m sorry. I didn’t think that this would happen. I just.” He tried to explain as best he could.

 

“Shawn you took a bottle of sleeping pills like they were mints. What the hell did you-“

 

“I. I don’t usually take that many. I usually stop… I just… It was so cold and I… I just couldn’t-I was so tired” He sobbed as the words rolled off his tongue before he could stop them.

 

Topanga’s eyes widened as the realization dawned on her.

 

“Shawn… How many times.” She stated it as softly as she could, the horror setting in.

 

“God damn it Topanga I screwed up I didn’t think I-“ He was shaken out of his train of thought as Topanga grabbed him by the shoulders, shaking him out of the downward spiral he was about to launch himself into.

 

“Shawn! How many times?” The force in her voice rendered him frozen faster than falling into the arctic ocean.

 

“I… I’m sorry.” He whispered. He leaned towards his shoulder, pulling his hospital gown down so his clavicle was visible. A set of black tallies stood in horrifying contrast to his skin. Each as rough as the one previous, they were homemade tattoo’s, it hadn’t been the first time she had seen them but this…

 

“Shawn that’s eight lines.” She sobbed, her finger reaching out to touch them. They were rough and jagged, the skin was raised, and they felt more like scars the tattoo’s, but they were as black as night.

 

“I guess I’ll add last night later…” He tried to smile like this was some sick joke, but it only made both of them cry harder into one another. It was a long time before they could calm themselves before they could steady their breathing before they could say anything again. They held one another for so long that Shawn wondered for a moment if he really had died and this was his taste of heaven before the universe dropped him into the pits of hell that he deserved.

 

“Shawn” Topanga’s whisper shook him out of his thoughts. He pulled away from her embrace and looked her in the eye once again. “The doctor… he said that you can go home tomorrow.”

 

He nodded after a while, his mind already jumping to his next destination. “Yeah, that’s fine. My stuff is probably at the motel still. I think my next job is-. “ Her fingers covered his lips again without so much as a warning of indication like this was now normal practice for her. He almost complained but she pushed his mouth harder as she felt him try to speak.

 

“Shawn, no more running. It’s time that you come home.” His eyes widened as she said it, his head already shaking in refusal, he tried to speak again but she wouldn’t relent.

 

“No Shawn. You’re not doing this anymore. Not to me, not to Cory, not to the kids. I’m taking you home.” She argued as he reached up to her wrist, pulling her hand away from him.

 

“Topanga stop. This isn’t a joke. I-“

 

“Shawn, I don’t care anymore. I’ve let you have it your way and it hasn’t worked.”

 

“I don’t have a home in New York Topanga.”

 

“Yes, you fucking do.”

 

“No, I don’t. The road is the only home I’ve got I-“

 

“That’s a lie and you know it.”

 

“Topanga I-“ The ringing of a phone forced them apart like a bucket of cold water being poured over their heads. It was already getting dark out and they were fighting like children in the middle of a hospital out in the middle of nowhere in Minnesota. Topanga groaned and pulled herself off of her childhood friend and the man she loved and walked over to the phone she had left lying in her chair hours earlier. She looked at it and glanced back at him instinctively.

 

“Who is it?” He didn’t need to ask that to know who was on the other end of that line and that he didn’t want to answer that call.

 

“Hello?” She answered as she made her way back to him, once again sitting on the bed by his side, still facing him as she turned the speaker on, so he could hear the frantic voice shouting into his phone from their apartment in New York.

 

“Please tell me he’s okay Topanga. Did he wake up again? Did they do more tests? Did the doctors say he’s still okay to come home? I booked the tickets. I know you told me to wait but I don’t want to. Should I just come? I- I can tell Eric to stay with the kids. Or I can bring them! They’re worried about him too. And maybe it’ll help? Do you think it’ll help? But he’ll listen right. Did he say anything. Topanga? Topanga!? Can you hear me!” The sound of his voice was enough to bring tears to his eyes. The fear in his voice though, that was just too much. He’d already spent the day crying like an idiot and now he could feel it all hitting him again like a fresh wave of pathetic sadness.

 

“Cor…” He whimpered, the voice on the other live finally going silent.

 

“Shawnie?” The sound of his own name was what broke the dam this time. He couldn’t stop sobbing. He didn’t know what to do and how to fix this or how to stop. Everything just hurt. He was like a giant open wound.  This was a pain he hadn’t felt before and he just didn’t know what to do. He pulled his knees to his chest and cried into them and he heard Cory call out to him again and again over the phone. Like he was softly trying to beacon him out of uncharted waters and back to him.

 

Topanga wiped her own tears away as she pulled him into her shoulder, letting him cry once more.

 

“I’m sorry Cor. I’m sorry I fucked up so bad. I… I just always manage to fuck up so bad I-“

 

“It’s okay Shawnie. Don’t worry about that stuff anymore. It’s time to come home.”

 

“Cor I don’t.”

 

“Shawn.” Topanga interjected before he began his previous tirade.

 

“Shawnie your home is here. It’s with me. It always has been. And my home… it’s over there with you. You’re my home and Topanga’s my home, and I know she’s yours too. No more running Shawn. Please.”

 

The desperation is his voice was like a dagger through the heart, the tears in Topanga’s eyes another.

 

“Okay Cor. I… I’ll come.”

 

 


End file.
